I do not won Marvel, Captain America, or anything affiliated with them, nor do I claim to do so. No copyright infringement was intended. I have no personal gain, monetary or otherwise from this work of fiction. Its sole purpose is entertainment.
"Bucky?" he asks, surprise clear in his voice. I am momentarily confused.
"Who the hell is Bucky?" I ask back. He says nothing, but there's something strange in his eyes. He looks…sad, no that's not it…betrayed. Yes, he looks betrayed. But why? We don't know each other.
He called me Bucky.
I don't know why that name means so much to me. I don't know who the man from the bridge is (Captain America, my mind answers, but that's not who he really is), or why he stopped fighting when my mask came off. I do know that I am not Bucky, whoever the hell he is. I cannot get the look of betrayal in his eyes out of my head. It sits at the front of my mind, haunting me.
He called me Bucky.
I feel nothing as Pierce's men roughly jostle my prosthetic arm back into place, lining up the circuits and fibers so that it will move once again. I am not here. No, I am trapped deep inside my mind. That man did this to me, for this I must kill him. It is no longer my mission, it is personal.
No! A thought crashes to the front of my mind and threatens to overwhelm me, but I remain strong. Must protect. Must protect who? Must not hurt. Must not hurt who? Ste-. Then nothing. The thought goes silent. It is replaced by the face of the man from earlier. He is much smaller. So am I, but in this scene, I am bigger than he is, the exact opposite of what it should be. We are sitting on the fire escape of a small apartment many years ago. He sports a black eye and a split lip. My own knuckles are cracked and bleeding, and I feel the distinct pain of a bruised rib. We are conversing and then laughing, until my rib throbs in pain. I say that I am fine. Then we laugh again.
I do not recall my actions. It appears that I have shaken off the men repairing my artificial limb. They flee for their lives, not knowing that I am too busy with the shattered remains of my memories to even bother with them. Suddenly Pierce is in the room. There is something very wrong with me.
He called me Bucky.
I do not hear Pierce's words. An echo of the man from the bridge's voice rings through my ears, asking if I'm Bucky and driving me insane. Who the hell is Bucky? Pierce is angry. His hand makes abrupt contact with my face, and my head snaps back from the force of the blow, but I am still trapped by that name. Pierce signals for his men.
I tilt back in my chair and open my mouth. This will be much easier if I submit. My teeth will stay intact if I allow them to put the rubber paddle between my jaws. I am clamped down into my chair. I cannot move. I want to submit, to forget this pain, but at the same time, I need to go. I need to get out of here. Names and faces surge to the front of my mind. I can almost remember. But cold harsh metal presses hard into my temples. Before I lose everything again, a single thought overpowers me. Bucky. I was called Bucky. I hated my first name, for some reason or another, and wanted to be called something else. A friend thought of it. It was a play on the first few letters of my middle name. That friend was Steve. Steve became Captain America. I am Bucky. It was just a stupid nickname back then, but right now, it is the entire world to me. I finally remember, and it is like a veil has been lifted from my memory. I want to cry out and make them stop; I remember! Pierce gives me one last, disappointed look. A man walks over to the console that controls the technology that will wipe my memory. I want to explain that I do not understand. Instead they choose to purge my mind. They could never understand.
He called me Bucky.